A modern computer system that's not part of a network is even more of an anomaly today than it was when we published the first edition of this book in 1991. But however widespread networks have become, managing a network and getting it to perform well can still be a problem.Managing NFS and NIS, in a new edition based on Solaris 8, is a guide to two tools that are absolutely essential to distributed computing environments: the Network Filesystem (NFS) and the Network Information System (formerly called the "yellow pages" or YP).The Network Filesystem, developed by Sun Microsystems, is fundamental to most Unix networks. It lets systems ranging from PCs and Unix workstations to large mainframes access each other's files transparently, and is the standard method for sharing files between different computer systems.As popular as NFS is, it's a "black box" for most users and administrators. Updated for NFS Version 3, Managing NFS and NIS offers detailed access to what's inside, including:

How to plan, set up, and debug an NFS network

Using the NFS automounter

Diskless workstations

PC/NFS

A new transport protocol for NFS (TCP/IP)

New security options (IPSec and Kerberos V5)

Diagnostic tools and utilities

NFS client and server tuning

NFS isn't really complete without its companion, NIS, a distributed database service for managing the most important administrative files, such as the passwd file and the hosts file. NIS centralizes administration of commonly replicated files, allowing a single change to the database rather than requiring changes on every system on the network.If you are managing a network of Unix systems, or are thinking of setting up a Unix network, you can't afford to overlook this book.

Mike Eisler

Mike Eisler graduated from the University of Central Florida with a master's degree in computer science in 1985. His first exposure to NFS and NIS came while working for Lachman Associates, Inc., where he was responsible for porting NFS and NIS to System V platforms. He later joined Sun Microsystems, Inc., responsible for projects such as NFS server performance, NFS/TCP, WebNFS, NFS secured with Kerberos V5, NFS Version 4, and JavaCard security. Mike has authored or coauthored several Request For Comments documents for the Internet Engineering Task Force, relating to NFS and security. He is currently a Technical Director at Network Appliance, Inc.

Ricardo Labiaga

Ricardo Labiaga is a staff engineer at Sun Microsystems, Inc., where he concentrates on networking and wireless technologies. Ricardo spent 8 years in the Solaris NFS group at Sun, where he worked on a variety of development projects with a primary focus on automounting and the NFS server. Ricardo is responsible for implementing significant functionality and performance enhancements to the automounter, as well as leading the NFS Server Logging design team. He holds a master of science degree in computer engineering from The University of Texas at El Paso.

Hal Stern

Hal Stern is a technical consultant with Sun Microsystems, where he specializes in networking, performance tuning, and kernel hacking. Hal earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Princeton University in 1984. Before joining Sun, Hal was a member of the technical staff at Polygen Corporation, developing UNIX-based molecular modelling and chemical information system products. Hal also worked on the Massive Memory Machine project as a member of the Research Staff in Princeton University's Department of Computer Science. His interests include large installation system administration, virtual memory management systems, performance, local and wide-area networking, interactive graphics, applications in financial services, cosmology, and the history of science. Hal is active in the Sun User's Group and has served on the advisory trustee board of the Princeton Broadcasting Service for seven years. Hal and his wife Toby live in Burlington, Massachusetts. At home, Hal enjoys carpentry, jazz music, cooking, and watching the stock market.

Our look is the result of reader comments, our own experimentation, and feedback from distribution channels. Distinctive covers complement our distinctive approach to technical topics, breathing personality and life into potentially dry subjects. The animal featured on the cover of Managing NFS and NIS is a tree porcupine, a name meaning "pig with spines." Like the guinea pig, the porcupine is not a pig at all, but a rodent. The tree porcupine is native to the eastern United States and northern Canada. In summer it feeds on green vegetation and the leaves and twigs of deciduous trees; in winter it eats the bark of evergreens. It will frequently chew away a complete ring of bark from around the tree, thereby killing it. As a result of such behavior, the porcupine does millions of dollars of damage annually to the timber industries.The spines of the tree porcupine are about two inches long, barbed, and apt to be concealed by the animal's long, coarse fur. Contrary to popular belief, the porcupine does not shoot these spines. The spines are loosely attached to the skin, so when the barb on the spine catches on an attacker, the spine will pull loose from the porcupine. Once embedded, spines tend to work their way further in and have been known to cause death when they puncture internal organs. Unix and its attendant programs can be unruly beasts. Nutshell Handbooks(R) help you tame them....Edie Freedman designed this cover and the entire Unix bestiary that appears on other Nutshell Handbooks. The beasts themselves are adapted from 19th-century engravings from the Dover Pictorial Archive.The text of this book is set in Times Roman; headings are Helvetica; examples are Courier. Text was prepared using SortQuadUs sqtroff text formatter. Figures are produced with a Macintosh. Printing is done on a Tegra Varityper 5000.

I find the material on NIS absolutely key and very nicely presented. It really is the NIS reference manual. It was a very helpful read when designing an large NIS environment with shared maps between several NIS domains.

This book is an incredibly tedious read. The author mentions an issue in very superficial detail in passing (but that would be a page worth) about 5 times. Each time, giving a little more info, and revealing that some things in the previous mention were actually wrong.

What makes this book so hard to read is the writing style. It's like being bombarded by trivialites of the subject. Maybe the author could have make this book 1/3rd as long, and cover the same material.

One thing I'd like to mention, is that this book, although published in 2001, does NOT cover NIS+ for some mysterous and unexplained reason. That means this book will not tell you anything about NIS encryption, hierarchies, or any of the other advanced features NIS doesn't have.

As another indication of the verbosity of the book, the first 50+ pages are dedicated to NIS, which is perhaps the most simple network protocol in use. Learing VI takes longer.

What bothers me the most, is that this is a subject I am seriously interested in. I really want to learn more about NFS, but no ammount of interest would keep your mind from wondering while trying to read this book. This review may seem harsh, but I can assure you, it is completely deserved. I've read numerous technical books before, but this is the first that I really cannot convince myself to continue reading, despite my interest.